Extra! Extra!

The summer brings out either the best or the worst in people. From silly flings to engagement rings, everything seems to change.

However, some key things always manage to stay the same.

On a typical August night, I was already running late for dinner with Tina. I just go back in town for the weekend after spending several of many weeks working in small town nowhere Windsor, Ontario. As glamorous as it may sound, and even though the shopping in Detroit was amazing (Diesel tote bag and boots half off with killer exchange rate!), I was excited to be back home—for the weekend. I had been gone so long it felt as if I was disconnected from the city and from my friends.

As I walked out the front door, I was happy to see Tina had not changed.

“Hey!” I yelled as I got in, excited to see the new goodies Tina had picked up from her usual Saturday trips to Kensington.

She simply smiled. I knew something was up. Either she wasn’t feeling well, she had a bone to pick with me, or she had some really big (and juicy) news.

“Okay, so what did Marnie do?” I asked.
“Nothing.”
“Did you bring your Tumbs?”
“Not that either.”
“His name?”
“I’ll tell you over dinner, I’m starving.”

This must have be some big news, I thought, as we drove down Bloor.

Over on the North end, Ryan was getting some new information from old news.

Nelson and Ryan had not seen each other since January when they fooled around in Nelson’s apartment drunk off wine while his boyfriend was out of town.

“Nelson, gosh, it’s been so long,” said Ryan as he stood up to greet Nelson at Under the Sun.

It turns out that Nelson had moved into the area and gave Ryan a call, one of those ‘my boyfriend’s out-of-town on business’ calls, to which Ryan certainly did not object to…if the meeting was in a public place, of course.

After a few Martini’s, Ryan was starting to forget his “in public” rule. And fifteen minutes later they were speeding up Yonge Street.

“Do you like the new house?” asked Nelson as they walked into the 1.5 million dollar Aurora home. With a classic brick exterior, 40-foot kitchen and 11-foot ceilings, marble flooring, and an all-oak staircase, Ryan didn’t really know how to respond without sounding impressed. After all, it was Nelson, the guy who lived in a room of a condo of an Asian family a short four years ago and left love to be with money. Lucky bastard, thought Ryan.

On that note, “How much of this did you actually buy?” he responded coyly.

“Enough to know that I have the right to make love to you in any given corner.”

Over at Spring Rolls on Dundas, I was gearing up to get what I knew was big news spinged on me. After a few minutes of minor chatting up, me talking about my new work in Windsor, she about her new search for a meaningful fashion job, I couldn’t take it any longer.

“So I told the receptionist she’s been such a big he—”

And then she said it.

“Bruno.”

“Excuse me? What Bruno? Firstly, she’s a she, and it’s the receptionist we’re talking about.”

“His name is Bruno.”

I quickly tried to think of who it could be and no one came to mind. Jean, Marco, Doug. Nope, no Bruno. He must have been hot off the presses if I didn’t hear about him.

“Marnie’s friend.”

“Marnie’s friend? But she’s like eighteen.”

“I know.”

Wait. Stop the presses.

It turns out Tina had been fooling around with Bruno for about a week. It happened one night when he came over to see Marnie, Tina’s younger sister, who is, for the record, six years her junior. Bruno had a crush on Tina since he was freshman doing his homework at their house. The only reason it started was because Bruno has become legal and had to make a move on Tina, especially since he caught her at a time when she was getting uncomfortably single.

According to Tina, the way he grabbed her and kissed her was so hot that one thing led to another, and before she knew it, they were sneaking around from house to house fooling around during the week.

“Tina, it’s hot when you’re the babysitter inviting your boyfriend over when the kids are asleep. It’s not hot when you’re the babysitter sleeping with the kids.”

“Shut up! He’s a perfectly grown man. He does construction!”

“You want construction workers, there are dozens of men up in Woodbridge who do construction that are a little closer to your age range,” I pulled out my cell phone. “Here, I have a couple of numbers.”

“Put down the little black book.”

“Don’t say, Tina Marie Carmichael.”

She just looked at me with those sad eyes. I was too late.

Over in Aurora, Ryan was looking into a pair of hungry eyes.

Sex with Nelson was always the best when Ryan had a buzz off wine, but this time it just felt dull. No matter what had happen between them, this was beyond Ryan. He wasn’t going to play sideline story to a headliner.

“So I’m meeting with Miguel on Monday for lunch,” I told Ryan while we were shopping the next day. I could tell he didn’t approve. “Now before you say anything, we have tried to meet up several times in the last few months, but our schedules never work out. Either I’m away or he’s not back in town. So it has to be done, I need to see him.”

“Gosh, how long has it been since you last saw each other?”

“Like two and a half years.”

Miguel and I dated about four years ago, when I was considerably younger, and he was considerably unaware of my age. I had been judging Tina this whole time when I had been in a situation similar only four short years ago. At that time in my life, Miguel was my love, my all; I would have done anything to stay with him. But with time, I realized that we weren’t ready to with one another at that point in our lives and I just had to let him go. We still, as far as I’m concerned, love each other, but right now it’s not what we need.

Since I last saw Miguel, I’ve talked to him a few times here and there. Not much has changed besides the fact that he started law school, moved to a new city hundreds of kilometers away, and was practically engaged. Despite Ryan’s worries that every time I see Miguel, I’m sent into an emotional reminiscent spiral, I was excited to see him, to catch up on young times.

As I told Tina’s story over dinner, Ryan went from shocked to excited to happy for her. “As long as she doesn’t fall for him, then it’s all good, let her have her fun it’s summer.”

“But that’s the thing, I think she wants him as more than just whatever they are.”

“Well, I, for one, am proud of her. She’s really inspired me give things a chance. Like, with Nelson, I just kept thinking of the negative, I could only do so much besides telling him that what we do is wrong. If he still wants to go for it, and it makes me feel good, then power to me.”

As I walked home that night, I realized that maybe I had judged Tina too quickly. So I got to thinking: If Miguel had given me a chance back then, why shouldn’t Tina give Bruno a chance right now? You’re never too old to try new things, right?

The next morning, I woke up to a much anticipated text message.

Pick you up at 1:30 read the words across my phone screen and I couldn’t be have been happier.

As the time drew nearer, Miguel was at my house at exactly 1:37pm and, like old news, I wasn’t in his car until 1:57pm.

“Miggggg, sorry I’m late.” I laughed as I saw him in his sleek Gucci shades.

He smiled and put his hand on my head. “Some things never change.”

The ride to the restaurant was awkward, and it felt like after the filler questions like “How have you been?” and “What have you been doing?” the conversation seemed to sag.

As the afternoon went on, it felt as if we had nothing left to talk about expect for old times and of what could have been and what had been. He told me about his blissful days with the rebound who is still around after four years, and I told him about Sunny, BiGuy and all the ones in between. But something was missing.

And as he paid the bill, like old times, and drove me home, like old times, there was no goodbye kiss at the end unlike old times.

I always said that Miguel and I would be together in ten years. My whole reasoning behind the break-up was that we needed time to grow up and stop being kids. But have we reached the point where we’re ready to have our own kids? It felt like in all the growing up we did, our lives became so settled. Miguel was still my first love, but no longer the kind of guy I saw myself with in ten years. It took me two years, but I realized we were better left as old friends with new news. I was truly ready to let go of the old days and embrace what was next.

Jokingly, we scheduled another lunch date for two years later, but something deep down told me it might actually work out that way at the rate of personal and professional schedules as he drove off…in the same old red car.

New

Every year in Toronto, there is a massive hype surrounding the ever popular New Years Eve festivities. Whether you spend it at the trendiest downtown lounge, a loud and expensive nightclub party, with family, or at Nathan Philips Square with almost every other Torontonian, there is always something for someone to do.

We were headed to Montreal. A frequent traveler to Montreal, I was not-so-excited to start another new year in the same not-so-new city. The drinking, the parties, the people, it was all very last year, but I was determined to have a good time and make the most out of doing something different.

Every year, there is also the famed New Years resolution. Some resolve to lose weight, be independent, finding the ‘one.’ I was resolving to be happy. I had spent the year repeating my patterns with men: BiGuy, Sunny, Mau, and this year, I was determined not to become a player in the same games, and lose myself in a draw. It was time for the new Paul, the new sexy-approachable, go-with-the-flow, don’t-care-if-you-don’t-call-me Paul. I was ready to be a whole new me, as clichéd as that may sound. Danielle, Amanda, and Ryan didn’t believe in New Years resolutions, feeling they were easily broken before they even started, so I kept mine a secret, hoping to prove them wrong.

Our New Years getaway increasingly seemed like it would be a less-than-perfect trip. Our hotel room was accidentally booked a day later than planned, we had not been able to reserve our New Years Eve party tickets, and Danielle’s company had a mix-up with payroll and no employees were paid on time. Two days and a six-hour bus ride later, I was in Montreal.

“This is it?” asked Amanda. With a double bed, and a pull out sofa, the room was almost as big as my closet.

And so that was the beginning of my so-called ‘new start.’ After a little unpacking and dinner at Pino’s, a Montreal hot spot, we were ready for a night on the town. Already a little tipsy from the drinks we had in the hotel room, we managed to make our way to Unity II, which hosts one of the best parties on a Friday night.

The music was hot, the men were hotter, and the drinks were cold. There were risers, two levels, and a nice, dark lounge in case you just wanted to sit and mingle. As we made our way around the club, we met up with our good friend Alex, a Montreal local we had met on our last visit. In the classic Montreal tradition, Alex was ‘chic,’ fun, and uncommonly handsome, and had a certain “je ne sais quoi” about him. He brought along his friend Iyss, a hot lesbian with wild hair.

Since their first meeting in August, Ryan had been infatuated with Alex. Up until that point, they had spent hours on end on the phone. This was Ryan’s chance, but all Alex seemed to want to do is dance—alone.

As I watched their dance floor body language, Alex was clearly trying to make himself seem available to the locals, leaving Ryan on the outskirts of town. So Ryan decided to do the next best thing and act like Alex wasn’t worth a thing.

Once I realized Ryan had things under control, with drink in hand, I decided to make my rounds around the club. Looking sexy-approachable, I smiled at all the guys I found attractive, and just as I was coming down the stairs I got a smile from a familiar face. A Torontonian’s face.
I had gone out with Tyson a few times in Toronto almost a year ago. It was very insignificant at
the time that I almost forgot his name.

“What are you doing here?” he coaxed me to the side of the stairs.

I explained to him that, as every other traveler, I was here to spend New Years and have a good time.

“Well,” he said into my ear. “You look great, and I know how to have a good time.” I wanted him to push him down the stairs so I could get to the real men, but instead, I listened. “I’m staying at the Governor Hotel, take my number.”

I reached into my pocket and grabbed my mobile, and handed it to him. As I was saving his number, I realized he was waiting to give him his phone. As we said our goodbyes, I couldn’t help but wonder: did I really want to start the New Year this way? I was looking for new, not old.

“Call me,” he yelled as I made my way down the stairs.

Three hours and two drinks later, I found myself at the corner booth in a trendy little restaurant in the village. I had begun feeling sick and decided to order a Ginger Ale.
As I sat there, I looked around at the other people in the diner. What were their new years resolutions? It was four in the morning the day before my new life was to begin, and I was drunk in another city sitting across from two virtual strangers, a drag queen, and some weird guy in a trench coat. Was this the new me I wanted to bring into the New Year?

As I stumbled into my hotel room in the early hours of the morning, I noticed the text message alert flashing on my phone.

My hotel? I’m alone…

It was Tyson. As I sat on the edge of my bed, I seriously considered the idea of making an early morning escape to his hotel room. And so I wrote to him:

Let me sleep a little and I’ll get back to you…

After a two-hour attempt at sleep, I grabbed the first outfit I could find and was in a cab on my way to the Governor Hotel. As he met me in the lobby, I realized I should have come better prepared. Walking out on to the executive business floor 28, looking at my reflection in the full-length mirror under the chandelier, I realized I did not belong here in my state of mind.

And so, with that, I found the only way to feel comfortable was to get rid of my clothes and I found myself making out with Tyson, under the expensive sheets. As Tyson got up to go to the bathroom, I looked over at the clock and realized that in twelve hours it would be a new year, one without these meaningless men where I was free to be happy. Before Tyson had a chance to come back and leap into action, I was already dressed and ready to say my goodbyes for a second, and final, time.

As I wandered the streets of Montreal, I got to thinking: could I have great, meaningless sex and still be the fabulous new me? Or did the fabulous new me mean no more meaningless sex?

An hour later, I was wandering the streets looking for the best New Years Eve party tickets with Danielle, Amanda, and Ryan. It was between Jet Nightclub and LaBoom, both very hot and expensive parties.

But then came a new problem to ruin my new year. Ryan decided he didn’t want waste his money when we could get drunk cheap on his own, go to a “not so hyped up” club, and buy a new pair of shoes with the rest. It complicated things even more, and on less than two hours sleep and already feeling down about my encounter with Tyson, I couldn’t take much more stress of this trip.

Amanda and Danielle settled on LaBoom, and Ryan and I settled on winging it. Back at the hotel room, the thought of the four of us not being together on New Years started to bother me more and more to the point where I couldn’t keep my sadness and anger inside.

Right there, on the sofa bed, in beautiful Montreal, on New Years Eve, I let out a small, but powerful cry that stopped Amanda from curling her hair, Ryan from mixing drinks, and Danielle from planning her outfit.

I felt like such a fool. I was four hours away from the new me, and I couldn’t believe I was leaving 2005 with tears. As I sat there overlooking the city, I got to thinking: was I placing too much pressure on myself to be this new person? Or did I just want everything to be perfect for the New Year? What is the price you have to pay to be the new you?

So as I saw my reflection in the window: red eyes, wet cheeks, I looked at the clock. It was about to be New Years and I wanted to do it right. So I picked myself off the couch and decided it was time to get dressed.

The night was amazing. Not only were the drinks good, but I also realized that spending New Years with one of my three best friends was still good enough, even great. And the girls would be back at the hotel room when I got there, so it was finally time to stop worrying about time and start having a good time.

“10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1. HAPPY NEW YEARS!” was all I heard around the club. And as the clock struck 12:01 AM, I realized it wasn’t so bad.

Later that night, Ryan and I found our way to a hotel party with a couple of guys from Boston. We thought they were cute and they thought we were sexy. As I started making out with a hot cop in the corner, I couldn’t help but affirm how much I liked the four-hour old new me. I was confident, approachable, and had managed to meet a sexy guy who I didn’t feel any emotion for and just wanted to have a good time with.

Our kissing found its way to his hotel room. As things progressed, I heard my phone ring and saw it was Ryan calling. I had to answer it.

“You ready to go?” he asked. “I’ve had enough of this guy.”

I looked over at the hot cop from Boston and decided the new me had enough fun for one night. “Yes, I’m ready. Meet me in the lobby in two.”

The next night, we did it all over again, but instead of ending up in a restaurant with strangers, or in a hotel room with Americans, we ended up at Second Cup, where the new Ryan felt like he had to get something off his chest.

“I felt really stupid that night with Alex. I can’t believe I was such a fool.”

I felt bad. Ryan was far from a fool, it was Alex who tried to lead him on and it was bittersweet that Ryan realized it in time.

“You feel bad?” I comforted him. “Do you remember me last night on the couch?”

We both laughed. “I know. It’s just sometimes, I feel like I’ll never be anything to anyone. This whole new me, its a flop, my resolutions were a joke.”

Suddenly, I wondered if the new anybody would ever work out. We are who we are for a reason. We’re built the way we are through our battles, our struggles, our lessons, our heartbreaks, and our stress. Who we are is simply based on our past. We’re not one new person, we’re a mix of events, stories—a mix of years. So like wine, maybe we only get better with every New Year.

As we sat in the empty coffee shop at three in the morning, we knew there was nowhere else we’d rather be than with each other or no one else’s we’d rather be than ourselves.
The next day, I woke feeling better than I had the past few days. I was ready for the New Year and couldn’t wait to get back home.

As we left the hotel room and got into the elevator, I looked at my reflection in the mirror. I was still the same old Paul. My face was no different. My eyes still held the same truth. And I got to thinking: why was I trying so hard to be a different person when I like the person I see in front of me? What did the new me have on the old me? Was there even a new me?

I had done and felt so much in the past three days that I was ready to come back. And so I got on the bus that would bring me home to Toronto to start the New Year, and my not so new life, as the not-so-new me. And that was just fine by me.

The Story Of...

We spend our lives living by the stories we hear around us. In ancient times, elders would tell younger children all sorts of myths and fables about dragons, evil spirits, and curses in order to keep them in line, out of mischief. Now that we’re a little older, these stories contain actual humans, and, as we keep growing old, they will have a long list of different names attached to them—Miguel the prince, Sunny the warlock, Nicholas the troll. But why do we believe those stories we hear? Are we so discouraged by modern day realities of life and love that we need story sedatives to help us get by? Like the one about the girl who dials the wrong number only to have a somewhat attractive-sounding man pick-up, later realizing after a two-hour conversation it was her soul mate. Yes, yes, we have all heard that one. I think it happened to Ryan’s friend of a friend.

In this game called dating, do we look for such stories for inspiration rather than fear? And once we master that fear, and put a name to the characters in our fables and myths, are they really what they appear to be? Or just a fragment of our imagination of what we hope it is or will become?

It was a beautiful Sunday morning, one of those bittersweet ones that only come along once a year the week before school starts. Everything was as it should be: Kevin was finally at peace and happy with being single; Amanda was talking to her on-again-off-again interest Chris, but with minor revisions to the script: Ryan was moving to Waterloo for school, and I was actually seeing someone. And on top of all this, it was my birthday.

I had been seeing this guy for a few weeks now. Tall, shaved head, on his way to being well built that he had arms the size of my thighs—but, again, with one minor revision: he was bisexual.

“So you’re seeing a bi guy is what you mean to tell us,” interrupted Kevin on our drive to my birthday bash.

It was no surprise Kevin reacted this way. I had spent the majority of my dating life up to that point hating on bi-sexual men, calling them the thieves from the case of the missing cookies from the cookie jar story, always taking one too many cookies. But this time it was different, he actually wanted more than just my cookie.

I knew it was different, it had to be different, and I had to make that clear before Kevin and Ryan took me back in time. “It doesn’t matter if he’s bi or not. I am through with looking at people in a black and white sort of way, maybe this will turn out to have a different story than all the others.”

Enter Ryan. “Oh, and what’s that story? The only possible plots for you and this bi guy are: he fucks you, he fucks you over and over again, or he just fucks you over. And to throw in some juicy drama: he never calls you again, and, this detail is essential to every bi guy story, he has a girlfriend.”

Surprisingly, he got that story from me. And so my current fling came to be called BiGuy.

But maybe Ryan was right. Was I just trying to create my own story to block out what seemed to be the inevitable truth? We all knew, as we sat there in silence, that the truth was that he would be gone by the next weekend and this would be one for the books.

The next week, after a month of talking to (dating, seeing, chilling with—whatever we were doing) BiGuy, I found myself center stage in his humid basement apartment. I was five for five; five visits to his house: five foreplay sessions. The tension was there. I had to have him. The fact that I kept him on the foreplay gear made me a little worried that my feelings were starting to run a bit deeper than anticipated.

“So what did you want to do,” he asked in a cool, calm, collective kind-of-voice. And so I pictured a little blurb from Cosmo’s “What He Really Means” saying ‘So wanna fuck?”

I casually suggested we watch a movie, by which I really meant: ‘Let’s fool around and then fuck.’ I was determined to prove my emotions were not about to get the best of me and I had to give it one last go before the summer ended. Even if he didn’t call me again, it would be a write-off.

And the casual movie turned into a casual encounter twenty minutes later. I was six for six. After our intense make out session, I rolled over on my stomach to look BiGuy in the face. I knew he was about to say something.

“Listen, I have to tell you something.” Here it was, the potential end of my story. But I had broken the mould, it had gone on for a repeated six chapters. “I really like spending time with you, and I know in the beginning it was all about fucking around and having fun. But with you, you make me feel good.” Was he actually saying this? Or was my mind playing tricks on me again. I nodded in amazement.

“I used to say I was bi to conform to an image I had, but now I think I know what I am and I understand myself better. Do you get what I’m saying?”

I had no idea what he was saying, but it sounded good, like something you would expect an “I love you” to come after. Now I was being extreme. Continue BiGuy.

“So what I am trying to say is that…” he hesitated. What is it? What is it that you’re trying to say! “I want to be with you.”

‘He wants to be with me?’ I thought. Or was this my mind playing tricks on me yet again.

And he continued. “And I know I said I didn’t know what I wanted, but the past few times we’ve been together, this week specifically, made me realize that I’m certain I want to get to know you better, just you and me. And this does not mean that I’m into guys, or girls, but that I’m into you.”

Wow. Was that not the best speech ever made for a fairytale or what? It was everything I wanted to hear, but not anything I wanted to believe.

In a world where Snow White meets her prince, Sleeping Beauty meets her prince, and Cinderella…meets her prince, I found it hard to believe that I would ever meet my prince, let alone a bi prince.

The next day, as the second week of school got into full swing, I told Amanda and Kevin the story over lunch, and Ryan via MSN. Their reactions had been similar to my own. No one had ever heard of the reformed bi guy, let alone their belief that the first one would be my BiGuy.

So I got to thinking. Maybe those fairytales and fables told by elders had some element of truth to them after all. And as for my friends and I, maybe we were too busy living with lost battles and stories of broken hearts that we couldn’t dare believe that miracles could happen. As they say, you cannot move forward until you acknowledge that things are no longer the way they were. Maybe that’s only true of certain things.

Perhaps there is a myth waiting to become reality in all of us after all? Or maybe we’re all just princesses keeping our princes in the wings until we’re ready to make them think they’re saving us? Either way, maybe that girl who found her soul mate in a wrong number is living happily ever after somewhere—past, present, or future.

From now on, I think I’ll be the one writing my story of love. I might not be living happily ever after just yet, or ever for that matter, but one thing is certain: I will forever be known as the friend’s friend who found something more than just a few fast fucks and a bad lesson in a bi guy once upon a time.